McCain POW Experiences Reduced to Late-Show Anecdotes

In the 2000 election cycle I fully supported John McCain. I donated money, bought merchandise and proselytized the virtues of a maverick war hero to all of my friends, regardless of their political affiliations. Today everyone talks about how McCain’s campaign was effectively finished after South Carolina’s primary. They discuss push polling and dirty tricks on the part of Karl Rove, and act like it was a foregone conclusion that Bush would get the nomination. This is a fine story told in hindsight, but at the time it was happening, no one who supported McCain thought he was done. Three days after South Carolina, McCain won Michigan and Arizona, and was polling strong in a number of Super Tuesday states. I backed McCain until his elimination on March 7^th, when I turned my support to Al Gore¹.

[1 The eventual winner, who fell victim to a coup d'état but went on to do more good for the country and the world in the next eight years than the man who was propped up as National Figurehead during that time.]

The point is I drank the Kool-aid. I was in the bag for McCain eight years ago, called him a maverick, and believed he was the right choice for America going forward. In 2004, I watched him sell out and campaign for George W. Bush, but didn’t write him off, because I didn’t feel qualified to evaluate his motives. There is a place for loyalty to one’s constituency, but helping the Bush re-election plan in a race that came down to only one state² is a horrible piece of the McCain legacy. As the 2008 primaries began I was a true undecided voter. I wasn’t leaning toward any candidate from any party. I was wary of Senator Clinton, hopeful about Senator Obama, and curious about Senator McCain. I didn’t know who I would support.

[2 Ohio, where it now seems a second coup d'état was taking place as voting machine vendor, and Republican supporter, Diebold engaged in vote rigging.]

In the end, it took only one Republican debate to see that I would not be voting GOP this year. The John McCain running this time around is not the same man I supported in 2000. The new McCain is surly, and what once manifested as thoughtfulness now seems to indicate slow-wittedness. Instead of getting older, he got old. He is also less principled, less certain of his opinions, and more prone to double talk. Watching him say he didn’t “know as much about the economy as [he] should” was painful³.

[3 As a four-term Senator, who also served in the House of Representatives, and sits on the commerce committee it is nearly inexcusable he not have a working knowledge of our economic system.]

The longer Senator McCain’s campaign continues, the less attractive he becomes as a candidate. Not because his healthcare plan involves taxing benefits, or his energy plan involves increased drilling for oil, or even because he has shown himself to not fully understand economic issues. The shine is wearing off as he lets the party leaders handle him, mold him, modify his ideals, and hijack his first executive decision by pressuring him to select Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate.

Eight years ago it was clear that being a prisoner of war did not uniquely qualify someone to be the President of the United States of America, but it was an indication of his dedication to service, dedication to country, and personal character. When joined with an apparent willingness to tell the truth in all situations, be honest with the electorate, and follow personal convictions regardless of party affiliation it was a nice punctuation mark to the Senator’s qualifications. In some ways it was the glue that held his persona together.

It is equally clear today that being a prisoner of war does not qualify John McCain to be president. Worse still, Senator McCain’s time as a prisoner of war no longer punctuates anything positive about his character. In July of this year, John McCain sold all rights ever held to the title of war hero when he lied about his time as a captive in the hopes of drawing the blue collar vote in Pennsylvania. First, the report from ABC News via KDKA [full video] in Pittsburgh:

Asked what first comes to his mind when he thinks of Pittsburgh, McCain chuckled, “the Steelers. I was a mediocre high school athlete but I loved and adored the sports but the Steelers really made a huge impression on me particularly in my early years.”

And then McCain told a rather moving story about his time as a P.O.W. “When I was first interrogated and really had to give some information because of the pressures, physical pressures on me, I named the starting lineup, defensive line of the Pittsburgh Steelers as my squadron mates.”

“Did you really?” asked the reporter.

“Yes,” McCain said.

“In your POW camp?” asked the reporter.

“Yes,” McCain said.

“Could you do it today?” asked the reporter.

“No, unfortunately,” McCain said.

Here’s one reason he likely couldn’t do it today — the Steelers aren’t the team whose defensive line McCain named for his Vietnamese tormentors. The Green Bay Packers are. At least according to every previous time McCain has told this story. And the McCain campaign just told ABC News that the senator made a mistake — it was, indeed, the Packers.

For those who are curious, McCain actually put the story in writing for his book Faith of My Fathers, writing:

“Once my condition had stabilized, my interrogators resumed their work. Demands for military information were accompanied by threats to terminate my medical treatment if I did not cooperate. Eventually, I gave them my ship’s name and squadron number, and confirmed that my target had been the power plant. Pressed for more useful information, I gave the names of the Green Bay Packers offensive line, and said they were members of my squadron. When asked to identify future targets, I simply recited the names of a number of North Vietnamese cities that had already been Bombed.” – pg 194 [isbn 0-375-50191-6]

To be clear, I don’t think there is anything wrong with McCain discussing his time as a POW if he feels comfortable with it. However, in the full video of the interview it becomes painfully obvious that the interviewer was not angling for a discussion of the Senator’s time in Vietnam. To volunteer the story makes McCain look desperate for votes, and cheapens a genuine and personal tragedy to the level of television movie of the week⁴. Moreover, it cheapens the Senator’s very character that he would pander to blue-collar, swing-state voters by changing the team from Green Bay to Pittsburgh.

[4 Actually, they did make a movie of the week about Senator McCain's time in the "Hanoi Hilton" and it was the Green Bay Packer's starting offensive line in the movie version too*.

*Hanoi Hilton is the term used by Senator McCain, see page 190 in the hardcover edition of Faith of My Fathers.]

I missed this story when it first broke in July, and I know it seems petty to many people. It isn’t. The campaign’s official statement was the Senator made a mistake. I don’t believe them. I have never experienced such horrible treatment as those in POW camps, but it seems unlikely McCain would suddenly forget what team he revealed under torture, particularly having told the story for eight years, and written it in a book. What is worse, this petty little lie undermines his testimony against torture. Again from ABC:

Explaining why he thinks torture can result in erroneous information, McCain wrote in Newsweek in 2005, “In my experience, abuse of prisoners often produces bad intelligence because under torture a person will say anything he thinks his captors want to hear–whether it is true or false–if he believes it will relieve his suffering. I was once physically coerced to provide my enemies with the names of the members of my flight squadron, information that had little if any value to my enemies as actionable intelligence. But I did not refuse, or repeat my insistence that I was required under the Geneva Conventions to provide my captors only with my name, rank and serial number. Instead, I gave them the names of the Green Bay Packers’ offensive line, knowing that providing them false information was sufficient to suspend the abuse.”

Looking at the interview and reading McCain’s original account is particularly upsetting for me. Perhaps the Senator doesn’t realize that when he tells his supporters something, and then lies about it for votes later on, it makes all of us them look uninformed and foolish. Perhaps he doesn’t care. Either way, John McCain has lost the right to campaign on his military service. Using it as a political tactic in such a calculated way brings dishonor to the thousands of soldiers who endured similar horrors while prisoners of an unwinnable war, and makes me ashamed I spent my time and money supporting a man I believed to be a hero who was really nothing more than an opportunist.